An Esoteric Love
by RayneWolf04
Summary: Sometimes, love is found in the most bizarre situations. The game has begun, and time is running out. Post-Reichenbach. Eventual Sherlolly.
1. Chapter 1

Molly Hooper had absolutely no idea what she was getting herself into the day Sherlock approached her in the dark shadows of the morgue. "What do you need?" She had asked, the words numb on her tongue. She had never seen him so fragile - so broken and so vulnerable, and it frightened her.

"You."

The answer terrified and bewildered and flattered and humiliated her all at once, and she would have sworn the temperature in the room dropped at least twenty degrees in the few seconds he had uttered the word.

You...

Me? She had thought once her mind was clear and working again. Why her? After all, she was simply a pathologist - an assistant and nothing more. And yet, so much conviction, so much longing and desperation had echoed in that single word, and in that moment, she had fallen to her knees in helpless love.

And so, as everyone who loves another does, she helped him without question and without motive, silently carrying out his brilliant plan. And at last, when the he had jumped and pronounced dead, she could not help but feel a slight triumphant pleasure at their work.

And then he was gone.

Disappeared without a single word of gratitude or finality. The last time she had seen him had been on that night in Saint Bart's, where his face was illuminated with the scars of moonlight slipping through the windows, and his hands cold and brisk, the slightest shake in them. Of course, what had she expected? An actual "Thanks" and "Goodbye?" Maybe. But the truth hurts, doesn't it? He had never shown acknowledgement to anyone besides himself, and dying wouldn't change that.

So, Molly stepped forward and continued on with life, despite her bleeding and scarred feet, the ghost of Sherlock Holmes haunting her every thought.

She had never imagined that afterwards, that ghosts would become all too real.

* * *

The London wind whipped Molly Hooper's face as she hurried down the street, her eyes cast down at the concrete below her. Today, today of all days . . . She bit her lip, tightening her jacket and stuffing her fingers down into the small crevices of warmth in her pockets.

Since Sherlock's memorial service weeks before, John had moved to his sister, Harry's place. Today had been the first time that Molly had seen the man since it all, and John Watson was no longer familiar - he had turned into a stranger.

"Hello, Molly," he said, leaning against the doorframe to her laboratory in Saint Barts. Molly had paused, almost dropping her papers in stunned alarm.

"J - John, hello," she replied slowly, the words heavy on her tongue. His eyes - even from a distance - now lacked the spark of life. His face - hollow. His hair - gray. He was a dead man walking, and the regret of knowing that she held the secret that could end his suffering churned within her. Wordlessly, she placed her papers on the table next to her, stepping forward and embracing the man.

At last, she pulled away, a strained smile on her face. "How are you doing?"

He shrugged, and Molly realized with pain that his hand gripped the cold handle of a cane. "I'm alive, aren't I?" His chuckle was hollow and raw, little humor resigning in it.

Molly glanced him over, swallowing her tears away. "Yes, I suppose so."

After an hour of strained conversation, John left, leaving the woman to feel even more alone than before. Her sobs echoed in the empty laboratory, her tears staining the tile floor.

She was suffering in her own mind.

Now, the young pathologist stumbled down the street, the pain numbed for the time being. To see John so distressed, so broken . . . it shattered her heart. "He's alive!" She had wanted to cry out when he had arrived, wanting to wring her arms around him and laugh. "He's alive and breathing and I am so very sorry!"

Sorry for what?

So many possible answers, and yet none could ever possibly cease the betrayal John would eventually feel when the truth was revealed . . . at her as well.

At last, Molly glanced up to the comforting shadow of her flat, and she could not help but sigh in relief. The prospects of finishing the pint of chocolate ice cream in her fridge pulled her up the stairs, and when at last when her fumbling hands unlocked the door to her flat, it was not ice cream that caused her scream aloud, but rather the unexpected figure of the presumed dead Sherlock Holmes sitting on her couch.

At her cry of surprise, the man glanced up, frowning slightly as if annoyed. "Do keep it down, Molly," he said disapprovingly, returning to his past activity of mindlessly flicking through the television channels. "I rather not be discovered quite yet."

Molly stood frozen in the doorway, a million emotions colliding within her at once. After a pure, whole minute of opening and closing her mouth in a desperate search for words, she decided on one particular emotion, and stepped forward, slamming the door behind her with a force that caused even Sherlock to glance up in surprise. "Sherlock Holmes!" She said, each word punctuated with anger. "You leave without a single word of gratitude or goodbye, leaving me to worry for weeks how you are, and then decide to just randomly turn up in my flat expecting me to be completely fine with it, when I myself have even been grieving, not over you but John!"

At the mention of John, his eyes widened, but before he could speak Molly was yelling once more. "You decide to fake your death, not even considering the pain your best friend will have to endure, including the rest of the world that cares about you, though I don't know how anymore could appreciate an arrogant, cold-hearted, unthoughtful sociopath! I don't even know why I even decided to help you in the first place!"

"High-functioning sociopath, Molly," the man whispered, staring at the pale carpet. At last, once she had caught her breath, did she see the despair upon the man's face. All at once, all her anger vanished and she was left feeling suddenly so cold in a room so silent she thought she could hear her own regret pounding within her. "Sherlock, I—"

"Don't apologize," the man said, raising a hand as if to dismiss the topic. He had returned to his normal behavior, but the shadow of her words still hung between them like a screaming cavern. For a moment, the two were frozen in a poise of awkwardness, neither attempting to speak or move. At last, she laughed—it was hollow and bittersweet, but a friendly laugh nonetheless.

"Sherlock, you have got to stop surprising me," she said, setting down her purse onto the couch and making her way to the kitchen, shedding herself of the bleached lab coat that clung from her timid figure in starched curtains. She shivered, and was unable to tell if the color rising in her cheeks were from the cold or not as she pulled open her fridge, searching for the long-awaited ice cream at last.

"And you need to begin observing more," he retorted back in his deep voice, following her inside and leaning against the doorway. God, she could feel his dark eyes studying her from behind.

"I'm a pathologist, Sherlock-not a detective."

"Consulting detective."

"Only one in the world, yes, I know." Molly rolled her eyes, unable to protect the small smile of amusement that grew on her lips. Opening the half-devoured tub of chocolate heaven and beginning to carve her way through it with her spoon, she turned and studied the man who had so wantonly walked into her life - the genius hidden behind a scarf and long coat. The child behind the stoic matureness. The gentleness behind the insults. The love behind the cold mindset. Few saw the true Sherlock Holmes—and sometimes, Molly Hooper was very, very lucky to be granted such an honor.

It was inevitable - from the day he entered Saint Barts, she had been drawn to him. He was so - simply amazing. The way he made his deductions, knew every aspect of her morning before she had spoken a word just from observing. He was a work of art, that Sherlock Holmes, and she was simply an observer.

"Molly," he began, his eyes steady and unwavering as they locked with her own. "I require a place to stay now that Baker Street is . . . unavailable to me. You and Mycroft are the only two people in London who know of my existence, and as I have sworn to forever loath my brother, the only reasonable conclusion is to move in with you."

As the words flew from his lips, she choked, coughing slightly and setting the tub upon the counter as she swallowed. "With me?" Had she heard him correctly? The offer seemed too good to possibly be true. The reality of the situation sunk in, and all at once countless questions and statements and feelings rolled crackled with electricity within her pounding heart. "But why?"

A smirk made its way onto his lips, as if the answer was so obviously clear. "I have business to finish with an old colleague of mine from when I attended Uni. He, a man of particular capabilities, knows far too well that I am alive, and has in fact called me back as to work on a favour for him, one I cannot oblige but to accept—"

He paused, noticing the intense shade of worry that had fallen over Molly, staring absently at him. "Yes?" He paused, glancing at her.

"Oh!" She stuttered, being pushed from her thoughts. "Um, well, I was just thinking -" The heat rose in her cheeks, and she looked away, digging back into her dessert and returning to the living room. "I have to work all week. Will you be alright on your own?"

Sherlock scoffed, falling onto the couch and closing his eyes. "Please. I'm not a child, no matter how much John insists I am."

Molly stiffened, unsure how to reply. She supposed John would be a touchy subject since "The Fall," as she called it. However, he seemed unnerved by the mention of his old flatmate, continuing to meditate upon the couch as stiff as he had been before. Did he miss him? Sherlock must miss him. But if he did, Molly was unable to peel the stone wall of defense away.

Sherlock peeked open an eye, peering past the dark curls cascading down his forehead and blinking the small figure of Molly into focus. He sighed, as if disappointed to see her still standing there, and folded his hands beneath his angular chin. "I'll be fine. It will be as if I'm not even here."

She opened her mouth as to ask where he had even been for the past month, but upon seeing his face contorted in silent concentration, she shook her head, smiling softly as she retreated to her room, falling onto the bed and shoveling the ice cream into her mouth as she mulled over the situation. Within moments, she was asleep, the spoon still in her hand. She did not hear the gentle knock or opening of the door, nor did she feel the ice cream spoon and tub be removed from her clasped hands as a blanket was pulled over her sleeping figure.

A clock ticked somewhere in her room, quietly tracking the time as it swam in cool waves around her. The sun breathed its last breaths before plunging behind the horizon as the sky was smothered in the fabric of night. The clock struck twelve. Cars sped by outside, people continuing on in their dreary lives, unaware of the ghost living within a pathologists home in an ironic turn of events. Far away, in an office cluttered by papers and books, a man rested his head in his hands on his desk, attempting to rid himself of the desperation and grief that had settled within his cracked heart, the phone number of a particular dead consulting detective sprawled in spider-like cursive upon a single piece of paper.

"God help me," he whispered, shaking his head and laughing bitterly in shaky breaths. A loud click resounded from the door and slowly, as the man glanced upward, it opened to reveal the silver streak of a gun, poised and loaded and staring right at him through a narrow point. The silence shattered and fell to the floor in jagged shards as an eruption exploded from the gun, the paper holding the number of Sherlock Holmes now stained by an ever-growing pool of crimson blood.

Molly Hooper continued to sleep, and Sherlock Holmes paced the dark living room of her flat.

And without knowing it, a game had begun.


	2. Chapter 2

Molly had awoken sometime around nine the next day, propping herself upright and running a hand through the tangled mess of a mane that reluctantly passed for hair. Glancing sideways at the clock hanging on the wall beside her, she groaned, falling back onto her bed and covering her face with the pillow as to hide herself from the clutches of morning. "It's still too early for a Saturday," she moaned aloud, shutting her eyes but finding sleep to be hidden, not to be found until late that following night.

Finally accepting the fact that no matter what she would not be able to fall back asleep, she swung her legs over the side of her bed, half heartedly wondering who had taken the ice cream from her in the middle of the night when she jumped forward in surprise to the abrupt curses resounding from her living room.

"What is it?!" She cried out, bursting through her door and stopping abruptly in the middle of the flat, throwing her head back and forth in search of the culprit of the shouts, stopping at last on the tall figure of Sherlock Holmes, whom of which she had temporarily forgotten currently lived with her. Self-consciously she pulled the overly large t-shift down so it almost draped over her knees, but thankfully the man paid no attention.

"They killed him! They bloody killed him!" Shouted Sherlock back at her, pacing the room as his hands swam through the curls laid in heaps upon his head in desperation.

Now Molly was terrified. "Killed who?!" She exclaimed, her eyes darting to the telly in fear that a recognized friend would appear on the screen. A reporter was standing outside a university, waving before a group of policemen and a group of paramedics crowding the doors, blinding the cameras with their flashing lights. Molly squinted to see whose face was alighted within the top left corner as the found victim, but without her glasses the world was revolving in a blur of vague colors.

Sherlock cursed again, kicking her sofa before collapsing into it in a sudden heap of exhaustion, as if all the energy had suddenly been jersey out of him, leaving a lifeless mannequin in his place, desperate and pathetically tired. "David Hollman, my colleague," he managed out finally. Upon seeing her look of confusion, he waved her away, groaning. "The one I was supposed to meet today."

Molly stared at him for a moment, and as realization hit her, she laughed aloud shakily, placing a hand to her forehead.

Glaring at her, Sherlock pursed his lips, sitting upright. "What?" He demanded. "What is so hilarious about my employer being discovered dead, shot in his office, only hours previous to our future meeting?"

"I was worried it was someone important," she stammered out, the adrenaline which had surged through her now absent and leaving her quivering in its place.

His jaw dropped, and he stared incredulously at her, groping for words to say as his face contorted with a thousand emotions. "This man was killed for a reason - a very imperative one, to be precise, and now—"

"Why are you so upset at this?" She asked upon his highly strange reaction towards the victim. It was unlike Sherlock to become so sentimental concerning a death of someone in a case—known or unknown. "Normally you would be bouncing off the walls with excitement."

"Yes, and normally you would be waking up at noon, dragging yourself to the kitchen where you would make yourself some coffee - two creamers to be precise - before returning to your couch to curl up with Toby and watch soap operas all day while ignoring your mother calling you yet again as to inquire about your love life with whathisface."

"It's Dillan. His name is Dillan," Molly said, a deep blush darkening her cheeks. God, he was cheeky this morning. "And we broke up last Tuesday."

"Exactly! This is infinitely more exhilarating than your definition of a 'weekend,' and yes, I would on a normal basis be quite in a splendid mood upon the discovery of a new case, but at the moment, I am considering my options with the utmost delicacy and importance."

"What options?"

He sighed, rolling his eyes. "If you have forgotten so soon, Miss Hooper, I am currently dead, and the scene will be more than likely overwhelmed with police."

Molly released a small 'oh' of understanding, nodding. "Yes, I suppose that is a bit of a drawback towards your investigation."

"Obviously," he snapped, each syllable snapping off his tongue.

"So . . . what are you going to do?"

"Do?"

"Yeah. What plan do you have to get in?"

"Get in?" He mused aloud to himself, repeating the question without actually having heard it, now lost and situated in his "thinking position" or whatnot as he leaned forward, his eyes staring at something distant yet faraway, his hands glued together beneath his cutting-edge angled chin. It was the times when he was like this Molly found herself irresistibly and unconsciously falling back in love with him. The sharp angles of his face which cast dark shadows around his cheekbones and nose, creating a thin contrast between god and man as his eyes—cerulean and so utterly beautiful—seemed lost in an evanescent glory before focusing on the pains of reality once more. He was a true work to behold—and his brilliance and stern fluidness only embraced her with their seduction once more. All Molly wished to do was gaze at him forever, lost in an infinity of perfection as the sun steadily climbed the blooming sky, saturating the world around them with a golden glow.

It was then she giggled, ripping the genius from his Mind Palace and causing his head to jerk upward, catching Molly's eye. He tilted his head as if to ask why she laughed, but the woman could only shake her head in reply. "Nothing," she said, pushing herself up from the couch. "Never mind it. Just . . . good morning to you too."

Sherlock opened his mouth as to reply but Molly was already gone, disappearing within the kitchen and leaving him in the living room alone. "You like your coffee black, yeah?" She called aloud to him from the other room, but Sherlock was no longer paying attention. He had leapt forward, raging across the room to the door and snatching a torn coat from the hangers protruding from the wall in an abrupt flurry of movement.

"Where're you goin'?" Molly asked, her head popping out from around the wall. "You know you can't leave-Sherlock!"

Her shouts were echoed within an empty room, no one to hear them but herself, the door still swinging open like a broken pendulum, gradually slowing to a stop.

"Sherlock!" She shouted once more, knowing all too well the man was far out of hearing range. The idiot was going to go and expose himself to the whole world and ruin everything. What a stubborn, stupid, unreliable, selfish _git._

Cursing, Molly started towards her room as to begin dressing herself as to chase after him, the coffee already forgotten in the kitchen where it would remain black and bitter and cold. It was only as she had exited the threshold to her flat when her phone rang in her pocket.

_GREG LESTRADE: Head forensic pathologist on holiday. Mind working overtime at BPP Uni? Recent murder. Be there asap. Thxs. -GL_

Yes, Sherlock was right. Saturdays were becoming _"infinitely" _more interesting with him around.


End file.
